Problem: Vanessa is 3 times as old as Ishaan and is also 12 years older than Ishaan. How old is Ishaan?
We can use the given information to write down two equations that describe the ages of Vanessa and Ishaan. Let Vanessa's current age be $v$ and Ishaan's current age be $i$ $v = 3i$ $v = i + 12$ Now we have two independent equations, and we can solve for our two unknowns. Since we are looking for $i$ , and both of our equations have $v$ alone on one side, this is a convenient time to use elimination. Subtracting the second equation from the first equation, we get: $0 =$ $3i$ $-$ $ (i + 12)$ which combines the information about $i$ from both of our original equations. Solving for $i$ , we get: $2 i = 12$ $i = 6$.